Icewind Dale 2 Complete

Believe it or not this was my first Infinity Engine(s) game.. even today I have not played most of Baldur's gate II .. :) But I think the criticism this game gets its because most players were expecting , well, BG with its engine and style. The main popular complaints of this game are: No NPCs, linear flow of the game, too much fight. What I see is: No recruitable uninteractive NPC with a couple banters, no overwheling open world, a lot of action. And mostly: D&D 3.5rd edition rules! I also never played Ad&d nor 2end edition.. and I objectively know that 3.5 is simply superior; specially in video games.. i mean here you have clear meaning and fun customization of stats per character feats and no wonder items that "set your XXX stat to YYY". This game is the only real way I see an enjoyable part management of 6. Even recent titles like Pillars of eternity get too fiddly when it comes to customization and items. The last star is due to the inexcusable lengtiness of some dungeons,the unexplicably worse graphics and some oddly untested features like .. Druid's shapeshift forms not unlocking properly (bug) at later levels.

The overall plot of this classic game is weak, but then again you do not play it for the plot. The real joy is crafting a party of characters and seeing them progress. The developers did a decent job adapting 3rd edition rules to a video game. If you want an entertaining time-killer, then you could certianly do worse than this gem. Dated graphics and bland plotline kept me from being able to off five stars.

Finally forced myself to finished it, after 3 years after buying it on GoG, and no - fights wasn't hard for me. There are other repellers. So this is obviously a game where one creates a party and tests how do they fight, right? It would be ok if not all the annoying puzzles implemented only to make the game longer. Many are unlogic and solvable only with a guide anyway. The D&D3x system contains many social and thieving mechanics, but these are used sporadically here to make a place for mentioned puzzles. What if i would like to finish the game without a single fight using my speech skills or sneaking my way in and stealing some papers compromising my enemies? Not in this game and actually hard to point such one, maybe DeusEx1 or Fallout2 were close to it. At least it is fine debugged and more player friendly then other Infinity games - i used only XP-mod. Therefore my 50% rating - either skipp it or grab a sword and stop complaining soldier! Note: I run it under playonlinux because under Win7 it was too sloow. Additionally to switch to KDE Alt+F4 works best.

i had onlyplayed baldur's gate before i played this game, its a massive step up and much more similar to the pencil and paper game of D&D i really like the plot and the gameplay is fine, no disc switching thanks to Gog

Difficult, entertaining, memorable. D&D is a great RPG system, and Icewind Dale along Baldur's Gate is one of the best uses of the system in a video game. Icewind Dale is a lot combat oriented than Baldur's Gate. Lock your fingers onto Quick Saves and Quick Loads. Memorise your spells and unsheathe your blade. The adventure has summoned you Will you answer it's call?